Abstract/Description

Food and Nutritional Strategies: Concepts- Objectives-Application.
Proceedings of a seminar, Brussels, November 3-7, 1986.
Available from CTA

Notes

Food and Nutritional Strategies :
Concepts Objectives Application
In 20 years the population of the ACP countries is expected to have doubled. For the most part, these countries could feed their own populations - if only they could find a way of making maximum use of all their resources. To do this, a systematic approach to the problem of nutrition is necessary - and this has led to the concept of food strategies.
In 1981 the EC decided to apply such strategies in four countries - Rwanda, Mali, Zambia and Kenya, each representing a group of African states. In order to monitor the application of these strategies, to draw the lessons to be learned from them, and put them at the disposal of other states, CTA and the Belgian Royal Academy of Overseas Sciences (ARSOM) held a week-long seminar in November 1986 in Brussels on the concept, objectives and application of food and nutritional strategies (see SPORE No. 5, pages 4-5)
Now CTA and the Academy have published the proceedings - in a comprehensive 419 page volume - jointly edited by Robert Dellere Head of CTA's Technical Division and Prof J.-J. Symoens, permanent Executive Secretary of ARSOM.
They have prepared a four-page; synopsis of the seminar, drawing together the methodological imperatives springing from the papers and discussions (three were identified: farmer participation, multidisciplinary, and continuity); the ways and means (of increasing productivity, improving quality of life, and minimizing climatic and economic risks); and the volume is completed by recommendations made during the last session of the seminar.
These last have been modified by the editors according to the remarks and suggestions of the participants, and cover most of the subjects tackled during the working sessions: complementarily of research, application, extension, training, and control; feasibility of programming and good coordination between projects; integration of nutritional and food strategies into a global approach to development; and conservation of natural resources.
These proceedings, which always avoid the impracticable or the unrealistic, make a valuable contribution to our understanding of the urgency of a world-wide application of strategies which take account of demographic structures, economic viability, local conditions and the need to improve standards of living in every way.
Food and Nutritional Strategies: Concepts- Objectives-Application.
Proceedings of a seminar, Brussels, November 3-7, 1986.
Available from CTA